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<h1><a href="https://archiveofourown.org/works/25013464">just watch it all burn .</a> by <a class='authorlink' href='https://archiveofourown.org/users/orphan_account/pseuds/orphan_account'>orphan_account</a></h1>

<table class="full">

<tr><td><b>Category:</b></td><td>SCP - Containment Breach, SCP Foundation</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Genre:</b></td><td>035 is a they, 049 burns shit, 049 is he, Angst, Angst and Tragedy, Arguing, Break Up, Burning, Fire, Heavy Angst, I'm Bad At Tagging, M/M, Memories, argument, before containment, i deadass refer to them as the doctor and the mask</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Language:</b></td><td>English</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Status:</b></td><td>Completed</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Published:</b></td><td>2020-07-01</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Updated:</b></td><td>2020-07-01</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Packaged:</b></td><td>2021-05-04 06:01:04</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Rating:</b></td><td>Not Rated</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Warnings:</b></td><td>No Archive Warnings Apply</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Chapters:</b></td><td>1</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Words:</b></td><td>1,404</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Publisher:</b></td><td>archiveofourown.org</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Story URL:</b></td><td>https://archiveofourown.org/works/25013464</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Author URL:</b></td><td>https://archiveofourown.org/users/orphan_account/pseuds/orphan_account</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Summary:</b></td><td><div class="userstuff">
              <p>before containment they were lovers.<br/>but a relationship between a parasite and it's host never ends well.</p>
            </div></td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Relationships:</b></td><td>SCP-035/SCP-049 (SCP Foundation)</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Comments:</b></td><td>4</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Kudos:</b></td><td>54</td></tr>

</table>

<a name="section0001"><h2>just watch it all burn .</h2></a>
<div class="story"><div class="userstuff module">
    
    <p>The golden flames illuminated the parchment. The doctor had already read this letter a few years ago, but this may be the last time he will. How naive was he to fall for these words. How did he get here? Why did they fall apart?</p>
<p>Maybe it started when they started leaving.</p>
<p>His beloved masked companion had a habit of leaving the room when the doctor operated. "It's so boring to see you revive commoners over and over again," they said when he confronted them about it. "We don't spend much time in these towns so I explore while you work." At the time he believed them. How could he deny them the freedom to explore? Besides he trusted his lover would only explore the city and not someone else.</p>
<p>That was until a cold winter's day. He'd rushed to the tavern they stayed at having finished his work early. A much deserved rest was in demand. Instead he saw the mask and some street whore in bed.</p>
<p>That memory makes him grip the parchment tighter. It's cruel irony that he's currently reading a promise of the mask's fidelity to the doctor. They always had the sweetest lies.</p>
<p>When the whore had left the room, the doctor yelled as he pleaded for an answer through wet sobs. "Why were you with that, that whore? Am I not enough for you? I have given you company, affection, love! What have I failed to provide you with?" The mask's usual joyous expression is replaced with one of sorrow, of disgust. It's one he'd seen before when someone had upset them.</p>
<p>"You never give me attention. All you care about is your cure." Their ever-present acidic secretion flowed a little stronger that usual. "I cannot handle being secondary to a cure to an intangible disease. You are so devoted to that cure! Yet you cannot even describe what it's curing. Only a mad man would do the things you do for something like that."</p>
<p>He scoffs and wipes away the tears blurring his vision. "You know about my work. You've seen what I do and never before have you complained about it like this," he said in a calmer tone, still brimming with anger. The doctor crept closer to the mask, body leaning a little away. "I gave you whatever attention I could. Yet I find you with a whore. I trusted you."</p>
<p>Funny how trust can be broken so easily. Maybe if the doctor never trusted the former lord, he wouldn't be sitting in front of this inferno right now.</p>
<p>"Darling I can't be expected to wait for hours, or even days, on end for you. I have to entertain myself. Besides they're fun little toys that are so desperate for my attention. They beg for it!" A few giggles escape their porcelain lips. "It's hilarious. And since we move around so much it doesn't hurt anyone. It's all in good fun."</p>
<p>The doctor didn't find it as funny though. Instead he found it sickening. He'd known his companion thrived off of attention but what if they viewed him a toy too? A toy they only kept around because he was their 'lover?'</p>
<p>"But you forgot who you travel with. Did you ever wonder if I could find out?" His voice lowers to almost inaudible. "Am I another one of your fun little toys?"</p>
<p>The mask doesn't answer. All they do is look on as the doctor chokes out a few more sobs.</p>
<p>"Answer me. Am I nothing but a toy for you to play with? Tell me! Have you never truly cared for me?" There's a tremble in his voice as it rises in anger. He paused for a moment when he heard the sizzle of the acid eating the floor. Slowly, his eyes went up to meet the glowing violet lights in his companion's eye holes. A shiver ran down his spine when the candle besides the bed began flickering about.</p>
<p>Growling their words out, they stand and saunter their way to him. "I have and still do care for you. I am the reason you can live, can move place to place, hell, I am the reason you breathe! So what if I saw you as just another toy in the beginning?" Their tone sweetens itself, though honeyed it cannot conceal it's poison. "Love, you have proven you're more than a toy to me. You are everything to me. I can't be without you." Their deteriorating hands grasped his like steel cuffs. "So let this slide. I swear that this will not happen again."</p>
<p>The doctor tries to pull his hands out of their grasp, but it was like struggling with Chinese finger traps. If this was another person then the mask would be able to enter his mind, but he's immune to their acid and persuasiveness. "Stop! How am I to believe you when I've seen you swindle entire kingdoms?" He shrieked, eyes wide with his back against the wall.</p>
<p>"Because I'm the only one you can trust in. We've connected before, I know everything about you my dearest. So let this little infidelity slide. " The lights were blinding as their anger. He turned away as his mind raced. The mask spoke the truth but for some reason he could not let go of the fact that he started out as only a toy to them. What could've happened to him if they decided he was nothing like the others? What was the reason?</p>
<p>"Wait. I need to know. Why am I such a unique toy?" They pause for a moment, taken aback by this. "Tell me the truth."</p>
<p>In hindsight, the truth should've been something that he figured out by then.</p>
<p>"You want the truth? My dear, you know about my hosts. It's so inconvenient to keep needing to change them. But a host that withstands this acid?" More giggles as they throw their host's head back. "Oh it's <strong>PERFECT</strong>. Really the only reason I let you stay. But of course I had to get attached." The laughter cuts short as they jerk their head back. "Is that what you wanted to hear?"</p>
<p>No response. The doctor's heart aches as he processes their words.</p>
<p>The memory hurts more as he reaches the end of the mask's poem. Though his misplaced trust started this relationship, he ended it with a blaze.</p>
<p>He pushes the mask away from him, freeing him from their grasp. They yelped as they stumbled backwards onto the floor. It gave him time to run across the room and grab the candle. "So I was just a parasite's perfect host? Good Lord, if that's what this has been then I!" Words failed to carry out his anger. But actions are as effective. He snatched a handful of poems out of his bag. "I'd ought to burn every memory of us away! We were nothing but you leeching away at me." </p>
<p>The mask tried to convince him to stop, but it's too late. The doctor has already set them ablaze. </p>
<p>"Darling! No! Stop please! I do love you even if you were just a toy to me. Please don't burn them I swear I can make this up to you! If you'd gi-!" Their now former lover cuts their pathetic pleads off. "Silence! I can't trust a wretched creature like you." More and more poems are pulled out of the doctor's bag. As the pile of burning poems grow, the room starts to catch fire. </p>
<p>The mask runs out the door, with nothing but a broken heart and a deteriorating host. However the doctor is lost in his fit of fury. Who cares if the damn tavern burns? Who cares if he burns? He was his own lover's marionette, now he must burn away his strings and all the good that came with it. </p>
<p>Now here he is. Sitting in the middle of a raging inferno. Reading what could very well be the last thing he'll ever read from the Mask. The man known as the Doctor stands as he tucks the poem in his bag. Sweat and tears drip off his face. He looked up at the burning roof where the fire had burned a sizeable hole. He closes his eyes as he accepted his fate.</p>
<p>Now he would be free. Free from being used by his former lover.</p>
<p>At least until they meet again in a shared prison.</p>
  </div><div class="fff_chapter_notes fff_foot_notes"><b>Author's Note:</b><blockquote class="userstuff"><p>hi you can blame this on me listening to First Burn for hours on end. this was me working on this at 3 am continuously for weeks so if you hate this dont worry i do too. hope u had a good time reading this angst even doe it's short and bad kdfjslkfjafjl</p></blockquote></div></div>
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